‘No meat,’ he says, laying a napkin across his lap, ‘for idle girls. Not in this house.’ Then Mr Way takes the platter away. Charles, his boy, looks sorry. I should like to strike him. Instead I must sit, twisting my hands into the fabric of my skirt, biting down my rage as I once swallowed tears, hearing the sliding of the meat upon my uncle’s ink-stained tongue, until I am dismissed. Next day at eight o’clock, I return to my work; and am careful never to yawn again.
